[WesternJournalism] China’s Newest Fighter Jet Looks A Lot Like…

Osmium · November 16, 2014

I love that game...

I'm just wondering why nobody took some designs from the game and tested it out IRL... The Delphinus line (Neucom R102) looks like it'll perform nicely...

I mean, look at this beauty right here...

Sure it might turn out to be a bit unstable, but weren't they able to fix the F16's initial instability with computers?

Edit: Sorry for going off like that... I just love my military hardware...

Also I don't think that design would every work because the wings look way too far forward and look too small. The center of mass looks way behind the center of lift (due to the weight of engines). Plus a lot of those wings look super thin and I don't think we have materials strong enough to withstand supersonic flight with those dimensions and I doubt they would offer much lift. Plus the angling of the wings I would imagine would cause it to be super unstable since it would constantly want to pitch up.

However that plane looks awesome even still

EDIT: Is ace combat on PC? Your pictures make me want to play it.

DigitalHermit · November 16, 2014

Also I don't think that design would every work because the wings look way too far forward and look too small. The center of mass looks way behind the center of lift (due to the weight of engines). Plus a lot of those wings look super thin and I don't think we have materials strong enough to withstand supersonic flight with those dimensions and I doubt they would offer much lift. Plus the angling of the wings I would imagine would cause it to be super unstable since it would constantly want to pitch up.

However that plane looks awesome even still

EDIT: Is ace combat on PC? Your pictures make me want to play it.

From the game, it handles close to an F16 (comparatively) and is actually more stable (and yes, it does tend to want to go up, but only so slightly)... Since we're talking far future tech here, there might be some new materials that allow this design to exist (there are even crazier designs in the game... biplane flying wing)... From the looks of it, it seems that it's a stripped down version of a delta-wing design (not sure)...

Here's the wiki link to the plane: http://acecombat.wikia.com/wiki/R-101_Delphinus_1

Possible basis of the design: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northrop_X-21

The only Ace Combat game on PC is Ace Combat Assault Horizon which is possibly the worst Ace Combat game in the franchise with fans denying it being part of the Ace Combat franchise...

If you have emulators for PS1, PS2, and PSP, you can play almost all of the Ace Combat games... The R101 is from Ace Combat 3: Electrosphere...

Berkut99 · November 16, 2014

Also I don't think that design would every work because the wings look way too far forward and look too small. The center of mass looks way behind the center of lift (due to the weight of engines). Plus a lot of those wings look super thin and I don't think we have materials strong enough to withstand supersonic flight with those dimensions and I doubt they would offer much lift. Plus the angling of the wings I would imagine would cause it to be super unstable since it would constantly want to pitch up.

However that plane looks awesome even still

EDIT: Is ace combat on PC? Your pictures make me want to play it.

Someone did model and place the R-101 in X-Plane 9 and it was able to fly according to that program's simulation ruleset. Supposedly the wings use active aeroelastics to operate in game. Arguably the wings are probably balanced by the chining of the front fuselage, similar to the Boeing Bird of Prey.

Fred Castellum · November 16, 2014

This really comes as no surprise to me.

As long as the AI doesn't go berserk (see: Stealth) or the humans control them remotely, I'm fine...

I'm waiting for COFFIN (neuro-link flight control system) to become reality if it ever does...

I'm confused as to why this is suddenly news again. The J-31 has been observed and known to the west for over a year. I'm not angry at the topic or the poster, it's just confounding to me that the media is freaking out over this plane when it's been already been exposed and dissected by armchair analysts for quite sometime now.

As an aside, I am happy to see someone familiar with Ace Combat 3 on here, Digital Hermit.

Ace Combat! Hell yeah!

@Berkut99

You'll probably like this one.